Cogito Ergo, Dean
by M.B.Liddle
Summary: Dean is dead. One small mistake, one fatal error is all it took, and now he is gone. He cannot be brought back, not through Heaven or Hell. Can Sam go on without his brother, or will he be forced to do something drastic? How far can belief in his brother go? How strong can a thought be?
1. Chapter 1

Cogito Ergo, Dean

Chapter 1

The sound of the gun filled the alleyway behind Fairview's Motel 12. It roared, bellowed in the still Pennsylvania night like the heavy handed hammer of an angry god. Fire blossomed from the end of the hexagonal barrel of the intricately carved antique revolver to form a deadly flower that bloomed almost as if in slow motion. A bead of black perforated the delicate fiery blossom. A bullet, as decoratively scrimshawed as the weapon that fired it, spun from the chamber with deadly purpose. It didn't have far to travel before colliding with its target. Metal met meat and the imprisoned magics of a long dead gun maker set about their grim task of unmaking the unfortunate recipient.

 _It doesn't really hurt_. The dark haired man with the brooding face and scruffy green jacket thought as a light began to shine from the red ringed hole that spread rapidly of his grungy shirt. _Hell, I've felt worse. Survived worse._ His body bucked under a sudden surge of red hot magical energy, his bravado shattered like glass. Thoughts were momentarily driven from his mind as the tidal forces within the bullet wound drove him to his knees. When he came back to himself, his thoughts turned outwards. He looked up at the shaking man before him, who still held the Colt revolver in a limp, shaking grip. No, not a man, but a boy. Some kid. The dying man chuckled as blood slipped from between clenched teeth. He'd killed monsters, devils, angels, and small gods. And here he was. He was going to be taken out by some two-bit thief who'd made a bad call on whose room he was going to turn over tonight. A thought came unbidden to his dying mind and played across his pained grimace. _Took a Colt to kill a Winchester._

Another torrent of energy coiled in his chest, driving thought away once again and replacing it with a blinding whiteness. The Colt dropped to the ground in front of him as the kid bolted. The dying man considered reaching for it, putting all of his last energies into taking a shot at the boy who'd taken him out. He would have, too, if his arms hadn't refused to obey him. He slipped forwards, landing on his elbows. Blood leaked slowly onto the gravel road. Somewhere far off, someone was yelling out. To the dying man's ears, it was nothing but a dull roar behind another duller roar. His body bucked again, his back arching and his teeth grinding together. He refused to cry out. Light seared from behind his eyes brightly enough to illuminate the space between the motel and the adjacent diner, then went out for good. The man was dead.

"Dean!" the other man cried. He was tall, lanky and long haired. He dressed similarly to the dying man, emulated him, though he would never admit it. He ran across the gravel that crunched just a little too loud in the silence that followed the gunshot. He moved fast, but not fast enough, his brother was in the last of his death throws by the time he skated to a stop and dropped to his knees in a spray of stone chips. The crushed rock tore at his already blood flecked jeans and cut his knees, but he paid it no mind. His attention was on the slumped form in front of him. "Dean?" His voice was hoarse, ragged as he laid a hand on the fallen form. Dean was still. Too still. No breath stirred his chest. "No." The tall man couldn't believe, he just couldn't. He saw the weapon lying in the gravel mere feet from him, noted the smoke emanating from that banded barrel, and dread rose up in his chest. It clawed at his innards, turning his legs and arms to water as he reached over and clutched at Colt's masterpiece. The chamber was warm. Three cartridges lay nestled in its clustered chambers. But four had been there when they'd stashed it in the locked safe. "Damn it, Dean, no! Why'd you have to run off!?" He shook the man, the corpse, his brother. But Dead could not respond.

In the distance, sirens blared. The entire police force of Fairview, Pennsylvania would be down here any minute. The tall man looked around, searched for his brother's killer, but found nothing but the unlit night on all sides. Hastily, he tucked the murderous revolver into his belt and struggled to lift his burly older sibling. Boots and knees and elbows scrabbled in the sharp gravel as he gained his footing. The fatigue of the long day and his fresh injuries weighed heavily on him as he stumbled around the front of the motel building. In the distance, someone was screaming. He'd have to change the plates once he crossed the boundaries of the small township. He'd have to call… someone. Bobby, maybe. The cranky old hunter would know what to do. The tall man made plans, anything to distract him from the weight he carried on his shoulders as he reached the low, crouching, animal form of Dean's Baby. The Chevrolet Impala, all black with silver fittings, lay still and silent as its owner. The tall man yanked open the passenger door and gently lay the body down in the back seat. The sirens were getting closer, but the tall man added no extra urgency. He made sure that Dean's head wasn't jammed uncomfortably against the far door, propped his knees up to keep him from rolling out of the seat, and threw a dusty old blanket over him.

He had to run across the driver's side door as red and blue lights began to flicker on the far side of the motel. The door jarred close as he shut it with just a little too much force. The throaty sound of the car's powerful engine filled his ears and shook his fingertips as he turned the key in the ignition. More gravel crunched under the tires and he was away. He spun out onto the road and put his foot down all the way to the floor. The motor roared and the car charged down the road that led to the interstate. He had made it. No one had seen him, by the time the police made the trip around the building he'd be long gone and out of sight. He allowed himself to relax, just a little. He leaned back into the leather seat and ran a hand through sweat matted hair. He addressed the air, a question on his lips that would go unanswered. "Okay, Sam. Now what?"

* * *

Rain lashed against the tar paper shingles and raked the windows of the house that lay nestled between stacks of junked cars in a lot just off the road in South Dakota. The unseasonal storm beat at the wooden siding and caused the whole building to creak as if in pain. Inside, the two occupants shared a different, but no less severe pain. Sam sat leaned forwards in the lumpy, beaten old sofa and stared into the lit fireplace that banished most, but not all, of the rain's chill. A forgotten tumbler half full of something that burned on the way down dangled precariously from his fingertips and swayed slightly with the unrestrained emotion that shook his body. Sam ran his free hand through the long hair that hung limply about his ears and let out a hollow, mournful sound before finding his tumbler once again and pressing it to his lips. The dark liquid felt like oil on his tongue as it slipped from the glass and into his gullet. He swallowed, suppressing a splutter. He wished for the drink to ease some of the wracking guilt that even now ate away at him. All it did was turn his stomach into a pit full of snakes.

"Tell me again how it happened," a gruff voice shook the distraught Winchester brother from his reverie. There was a man standing in the open doorway. Concern twisted the short beard that graced his well-worn, experienced face, but his eyes were hard, shrewd. He had a drink in his own hand, one of many he'd downed already that night. Every night since he'd gotten the phone call that one of his boys had fallen on the field of battle. Only this time, he wouldn't be getting up again. Not even Dean Winchester could shrug off Death forever. "Sam…"

"Damn it, Bobby!" Sam shook with a sudden violent outburst. "What difference does it make? You said it yourself, Dean's dead. Not coming back." He knocked back another slug of his drink, enough to drain the glass completely. He held it out towards the older hunter. He could still feel, that meant that he wasn't done drinking.

"The difference it makes is that you haven't told me what you two idjits were doing all the way out in Fairview, Pennsylvania in the first place. The difference is I need to know what you found out there, if it's still alive and kicking, and if I need to round up a posse to make that kicking stop. And most of all, the difference is that I don't know why in the Hell you needed to drag the Colt out there. The Colt, Sam." Bobby knocked back his own drink. The sternness of his face softened a little as he watched the younger man shake on his couch. "Look, I know what it means to lose family. Hurts like Hell and worse. But there's a whole world of people out there. We can both do our mournin' when the job is done." He came around the dilapidated couch and let himself drop heavily into its overstuffed confines. He plunked the bottle of his finest booze down with a dull thunk upon the rickety table. Sam reached for it, but he slid it away.

"Bobby…"

"Drink later, talk now." Bobby's face was set, resolute. It was not the face of a man about to change his mind. Sam sighed heavily and sank back into the sofa. His eyes were glassy as he slowly opened them, but he spoke steadily and without stumbling.

"Alright. I'll talk." He stopped for a second to gather his thoughts. The empty tumbler still swung in his hands. Outside, the first peals of distant thunder rolled across the South Dakota country side. The rain redoubled against the roof and against the junked cars outside until it played a symphony of percussion to underline Sam Winchester's words. "We had a case. A nasty one. A monster called…

* * *

…Khazrak the One Eye?" Dean snorted with derision. "How'd he get that name, doya think?" The engine of the Impala thrummed as he gunned it through the open Pennsylvania farmland. This was always his favorite part of the job. The road was empty, the windows were down, and the radio was turned all the way up. Dean sang along to a snippet of the song playing on the current station. "…place is a madhouse, feels like being cloned!"

"Well the lore says… he only has one eye…" Sam answered awkwardly, trying to compete with the thumping drums of whatever noise his brother had selected for this afternoon's driving. He finally stopped trying to raise his voice and reached for the dial. Dean slapped the grasping hand away.

"Hey, never touch another man's radio," he growled, though there was no threat in his voice. This was, in fact, a time honored tradition between the two.

Sam fixed his brother with an aggravated stare. "Come on, Dean. This is serious."

"Alright, alright." Dean twisted the knob and brought the music back below ear splitting levels. "So, what's the deal with ol' Kazgraz? And why's he only got one eye? You taking us to fight some kind of cyclops?"

"Khazrak. And it says here that it got shot away," Sam rejoined as he thumbed through the ancient and creaky leather bound journal. "Yes, here's the passage. _And I looked upon mine foe at last. The One who walks in the woods and steals our sons and daughters. He was terrifying to me, his visage bestial to behold. Like that of a great horned goat who walked on his hind legs. His cloven hooves were like that of a cart horse and his hands were great claws that grasped his crude weapon. His hooded head bore a great curving horn of a ram; the other horn was broken in our last encounter. His eyes gleamed malevolently beneath that hood. I raised my flintlock to deliver my final justice. I sparked the flame, and lo did I see his right eye plucked from its socket by my bullet of silver. An eye for an eye, the Book says. I have taken his eye, as he has taken mine. The beast is still now. I will bury it in woods that it used to stalk. It seems… seemly. The job is done."_

"Yeah but if the job was done, why are we heading up there right now?" Dean asked. He absent mindedly scratched at his chest. "Sounds to me like our buddy the Pilgrim hunter took him out."

"Well, at least he thought he did. That wasn't the last entry in the journal. Looks like the killings he describes started up again a while after. He never found Khazrak again, but he was sure that he hadn't killed it." Sam flipped through the book again. "They tailed off just before the author died. He fought the beast must have died of old age but…" He carefully closed the age ravaged tome and set it aside, instead reaching for the stack of computer print-outs. "These are some of the latest missing persons reports from the area. Matches One Eye's M.O. Late night disappearances, all around the same patch of woods. And then there's the cattle mutilations."

"Cattle mutilations? What, the guy can't stop in for a hamburger like the rest of us?" Dean chuckled at his own joke.

"He… uh.. takes liberties with the livestock," Sam answered with a grimace. "They don't generally survive."

Dean's face twisted in a look of disgust. "Okay, so looks like we've got us a horny goatman to kill. Why do we need the Colt with us?" He patted the oilcloth wrapped revolver that lay on the seat between the two brothers.

"Guy who hunted it before tried a little bit of everything and couldn't make it stick," Sam said. "Silver, cold iron, wood from local trees, holy water, unholy water, the works. He made it his life's work to hunt down and kill this thing, and it looks like it's still up and walking. I figure, better safe than sorry." He put the print-outs down and patted the journal. "I figure he deserves a little closure. Plus, I don't like the idea of an unkillable monster loping around the Northeast with Eve on the loose."

"Yeah, don't want the purple people eater finding his way back to mommy. So, what's the deal? We roll up to this town, run off into the woods, and hope we don't get mistaken for a pair of sexy cows?"

"It's going to be a little more complicated than that," Sam responded, intentionally ignoring his brother's comment. "Looks like the attacks are centered around this one patch of trees that backs onto a whole bunch of farms in the area. Only one hasn't been hit yet, the… um… Strutemyer property. We stake out that farm tonight, odds are good we'll catch this thing out."

"So what's our play? F.B.I.? Sherriff's Department? Aww, come on!" Dean's face fell as he saw the badges his brother held up. "FDA? We never get to be anyone fun anymore."

* * *

"So, did you get him? This One Eyed monster?" Bobby asked cautiously. Sam had stopped in the middle of his tale to stare forlornly into the fire. The rain still beat at the windows, driven by a rising wind that rattled the panes as it drove in across the lot. The taller man sipped slowly from the drink that his mentor had poured while he was talking.

"Yeah. Yeah, we got him. Wasn't easy, had to burn down the forest to drive the thing out, but Dean shot him in the head and he went down hard. Salted the corpse and scattered the ashes just to be sure." He gulped, a deep swallow burning his throat and adding fire to his words. "That was when we… when Dean, he…" Sam stopped abruptly and put his head in his hands. "He wanted to celebrate."

"Let me guess, a tour of all the bars in town?"

"Turns out there was just the one bar," Sam answered ruefully. "We stowed the Colt at the motel, found our way into the local dive, spent a couple hours. We didn't realize that our room was being watched." He finished his glass and dropped it down on the table. He scrubbed at his red-rimmed eyes with his palms and resisted the wave of fresh, raw emotion that threatened to boil up inside. It was like holding close the valve of a steam engine with his bare hands. He hunched over, a solitary sob escaping confinement.

"One of Eve's monsters?" Bobby asked with evident concern.

"No." Sam answered. "That might have made some sense…."

* * *

Sam swayed slightly as he walked beside his exultant brother. The two leaned into each other to hide their inebriation, but the joy of victory was flush above both their faces in a way that was impossible to disguise. The younger Winchester wiped absent mindedly at the smudge of soot on his brown jacket. The older brother sang a snatch of something out of tune and finished off a half forgotten line with a hearty guffaw.

"Sammy, we might just be the best hunters on the face of this God damned earth." He studiously put one foot in front of the other as they turned the corner onto the main street, passing the darkened windows of the small butcher's shop.

"Yeah, or the luckiest. If you hadn't tripped when you did, that thing would have taken your head right off!"

Dean made a dismissive noise. "Pssssh. If you're referring to my genius tactical maneuver, then you should know it was all skill. All skill." He stumbled slightly. Sam caught him by his elbow before he could pitch face first into the asphalt of the road.

"Yeah, Dean, alright. Why don't you just go and spell 'maneuver' for me. If you're such a genius." He gave his older brother a friendly jab in the ribs as the two ducked into the alleyway that separated the butcher from the motel complex.

"Lessee. M… a... n… um, uvver. Look, Sammy, point is we just killed the unkillable. And I'll tell you what, that bitch mom of all monsters is going to be next. Jus' a matter of time until you and Bobby put your nerd heads together and figure something out."

"Whatever you say, Dea…" Sam stopped mid-word, struck silent by the sight before him. Their motel room door was ajar, the flimsy cheap lock broken. A thin bootprint marked the spot that someone had kicked in the door. Sam clamped a hand over Dean's mouth to block his impatient prompt for his brother to finish his sentence. "Shhhhhh." He hissed.

Dean yanked the hand off his face, but his next question was a whisper. "What?"

Sam pointed to the door and went for the concealed handgun in his waistband. Dean's face sharpened, the signs of inebriation flushed in an instant by a cold rush of adrenaline. Someone or something was in their room. In their room with the Colt. He drew his own weapon, his thumb brushing over the well-worn safety catch as if it were a lover. He motioned forwards with a jerk of his head. The two brothers moved silently over the gravel of the parking lot, their boots barely crunching on the loose rock chips. Sam reached the door first and pressed his shoulder into the frame. No sound emenated from the darkened interior of the room. He gestured the all clear to Dean. The older brother whipped around to the other side of the open doorway and covered the visible sliver of the inside with his pistol. Nothing moved, all was still.

Dean slipped inside. The room was lit only by the half full moon outside the windows, but what little light did shine in revealed a sight that made his stomach drop. The room had been searched thoroughly. Drawers and doors hung open, their contents spread on the cheap blue carpet. The mattresses of both beds had been flipped over and slit open. Sheets lay jumbled in a corner where they had been tossed in haste. Dean's eyes searched imploringly for the dark green duffle bag and found nothing. Then his eyes found the room's small safe. It looked like someone had knocked in the combination lock with a hammer, leaving the door hanging open to reveal an empty compartment. Dean's blood ran cold. He tried to swallow on a suddenly dry throat. "Sammy…"

"I see it." Sam rushed to the safe, taking a knee and yanking open the door. "Dean, it's gone."

"God damn it!" Dean roared. He lashed out at a nearby end table with a booted foot, sending it crashing over. He ran a hand through his short brown hair and shook his head. "I told you we should have kept it in the car!" He turned around and just managed to catch a glimpse of someone in the uncovered outside window. A startled looking kid, dressed in a grey hooded sweatshirt and dark jeans. In his hands, the long barreled shape of a revolver. "Hey!"

The kid bolted. Dean saw red and charged after him, the devastation of his motel room forgotten.

"Dean, wait!" Sam called after him. There was no answer but the sound of leather on stone as the chase went on. Sam shook his head and began to walk after his brother. Then the gunshot came. "Dean!"

* * *

The fire was little more than dull embers in a smoldering hearth. The empty bottle sat on the table between the two men. Bobby's mustache twitched as he grunted softly as the younger man finished his tale. "Hmm. So, that's it then." Resignation was threaded through his words. "The end of Dean Winchester. Shot for his gun in Fairview, Pennsylvania. At least he went down at the end of a successful hunt."

"I just wish…"

"Don't," Bobby cut him off sternly. "What you were about to say. You wish you could have done something. There weren't a damn thing you could have done short of tacklin' your brother down to the ground to stop him runnin' off. And that would have lost you the Colt besides. No, ain't nothing you could have done. Though I get the feeling you've already gone above and beyond on Dean's account. Unless you're trying to tell me it took you a week to drive the body back here."

Sam looked away guiltily. He studiously avoided Bobby's inquisitively raised eyebrow. Finally, he spoke, his words slightly slurred. "They couldn't bring him back." He wiped his eyes with the back of his sleeve. "Not Heaven or Hell. 'Nothing to bring back' they both said. 'Utterly destroyed.'" He hiccoughed. "Took some extra pleasure to rub that one in I bet. Had to look for something else. Find an alternative. I just don't want to believe…"

"Aww Hell, Sam. You shouldn't have put yourself through that. God knows you've been through that too many times already. And as for believing, well… Facts don't care what you believe." The older man grumbled as he propelled himself out of the sofa to go throw another log on the fire. "Why, I…" He stopped, half turned towards his surviving protégé. The guttering flames cast his grizzled face in partial shadow. "What kind of alternative?" He asked suspiciously. The look of guilt on Sam's face intensified. He nudged a ragged bag behind the seat, failing to fully conceal the dusty tome within. "Sam, what is that? What have you brought into my house?"

With two quick steps he was across the room. The younger man tried to stop him. On a better day, he would have succeeded, but not today. Bobby was an old hand at working through the bottle while Sam's actions were fumbling, clumsy. Thick fingers grasped the book and pulled hard. The book in the bag slipped out. Silver lettering, etched in Greek shone in the firelight as a fresh peal of thunder shook the windows. "No."

"Bobby, I…"

"Necromancy, Sam? Have you lost your God damned mind!?" Bobby roared. The sympathy that had lined his face was gone. "What? You thought it would be okay to raise Dean's corpse from the dead like a puppet?"

"I need my brother." Sam said in little more than a whisper.

"I don't care how much you think you need him. What this book'll give you ain't him. A freaking zombie. You may as well invite a demon to come in and ride him around like a meat suit. How could you be so stupid, boy? 'sides, even if you bring something back that walks and talks and hunts like Dean, you think it's going to stay that way? You've seen what messing with this stuff does before. And that's not even counting what all the other hunters might think of your little bit of casual necromancy."

"I don't care what the others think." Sam spat miserably, though the look of defeat was already in his eyes. He sank in on the couch and into himself as Bobby proceeded to hurl the book of black magic into the other room.

"Well it's just as well you've got someone looking out for you what does. Now, I'm going to pretend I didn't see that little touch of madness, and you are going to help me give Dean the funeral he deserves. A proper, Hunter's funeral. Now."

There was nothing to do but agree. Sam slogged out into the rain and the wind behind his mentor and helped stack the wood for a funeral pyre. He tried not to look at the black Impala, the impromptu hearse that had carried his brother's body for far too long. He tried to ignore the sting of the gasoline in his nostrils as he helped Bobby liberally douse the pile and the cloth wrapped form of Dean. He looked away when the match was thrown and the salt was sprinkled. He blocked out the incantation in Latin as the body began to burn, its burnt meat stink rising above the fumes. He didn't feel the rain as it splattered over his face or the wind as it tugged at his hair and clothes. He just stood, staring into the firelight. He stood there all night, even after bobby had left to spread the ill tidings. It was early morning when the last embers finally went out in the spreading pile of ashes.

Sam knelt in the sodden dirt of the junker's yard. Before him, the rain had made a thick mud of the funeral ash. His mind was numb, empty but for a pair of phrases that kept repeating themselves around and around in his brain. _I just don't want to believe. Don't care what you believe._

Believe.

An idea dawned in the back of his mind as dimly at first as the dawn that seeped over the wooded landscape of Sioux Falls. It was stitched together of memory and half-forgotten lore, of fierce hope and bitter desperation.

Believe. I believe.

Before Sam new what he was doing, he had scooped up a handful of the wet ash. It was cold as ice in his hands as he loped over to where the Impala loomed silently.

I believe.

Sam knelt before the hood and clung to the thoughts that raced around his brain. Then, in the dim light of the morning, he began to paint.


	2. Chapter 2

Cogito Ergo, Dean

Chapter 2

Waking up was a stone bitch. The world around Dean Winchester was a blurry mixed up mess as he began to come to. Nothing seemed to make sense, not up, not down. It was like someone had scrambled the channels in his brain and was trying to put in a straight line with a garden rake. Slowly, things started to shake into some sort of order, though the picture coming in from his eyes was still hazy and full of shadows. He was in Bobby's junkyard; that much was sure. The stacks of junked cars made pillars around him. He tried to turn his head but found his vision spinning, too fast to match his movements. Something was very wrong, something he couldn't quite put into words. _Must be one hell of a hangover_ , he quipped to himself. The words echoed with strange weight. Dean tried to press his palms to his temples to block out the loudness of his thoughts. His eyes told him that his arms were moving, but there was no feeling, no weight. His hands were cupped around his head, but they left no pressure.

That was when he found the words for what was wrong. He didn't feel anything. He couldn't feel the ground pushing up against his feet, though he could see two booted feet pressing lightly into the sodden ground. He felt like he was floating, weightless. Like his body wasn't there. _Am I…_ A question too terrible to ask rattled around the space close to his head, the words as heavy as bricks. Dean closed his eyes until the dreadful racket went away. When he opened them again, he wasn't alone. The world had a little more color now, a little more shape. Enough for the older Winchester to pick out the form of his younger brother. The long haired, lanky man sat cross legged in the dirt, apparently blind to the mud seeping into his clothes. His stormy brow was knit in intense concentration above a face that looked like it hadn't been shaved for a week. Sam's eyes were closed tight.

"Sammy?" Dean spoke. Or at least he thought he did. The words didn't weave and flitter around him like a flock of angry birds, but at the same time Sam made no sign of stirring. Dean spoke again, this time concentrating on moving his lips and breathing out to form words. Some sensation had returned, but he still felt weightless and unbalanced, like his body had been put together out of smoke. "Sammy!"

Sam's eyes snapped open. His face was still screwed up tight, but the barest trace of a victorious smile quirked his lips. "Dean." The name hung in the still, damp air. As it reached Dean's ears, it seemed to pass through him and change him as it went. He felt more solid than before.

"Sam, am I a ghost?" Dean tried not to let the rising panic take control of his voice. He had to be strong. He set his jaw defiantly, as if telling the world that he wasn't scared would make it true. "The last thing I can remember…" He trailed off. He couldn't remember. At least, he couldn't remember how he got here. He remembered Pennsylvania, the blur of walking back from the bar, the gun, the noise. It all added up to a dead Dean. But here he was. Or was he?

"You're not a ghost, Dean," Sam answered. His voice was tired. Idly, Dean wondered when his brother had last gotten some sleep. "Don't worry, you're not haunting me."

Relief bloomed, though it was tempered by confusion. "Great. That's just great, Sam. Thought I'd died on you there for a second. Worried I'd formed a bad habit." Sadness twisted Sam's exhausted face. _Uh oh._ "I… am alive, right? 'Cos let me tell you, I just felt really funky back there and I don't think Bobby's cooking could have caused all of it. Where is old beer guts and misery anyhow? Is something burning? I think I smell something burning." The questions came one after another. Trying to stave off the inevitable, a voice whispered in the back of his mind.

"Bobby's inside," Sam answered. There was something he wanted to say, something he couldn't say.

"Sam, you're starting to spook me here. And seriously, what is that smell? You might want to go check on Bobby. I think he's about to burn his house down trying to make sausages surprise."

"Bobby's not going to burn down the house, Dean," Sam said sadly. "The fire's all burnt out. For a while now. A funeral fire. Your funeral fire." He announced the last three words with a voice soaked in dread. Dean felt his world come apart with the pronouncement. Suddenly, it wasn't like his body was put together out of smoke, it was like he was made out of a swarm of angry bees. The colors of the world flowed together before his eyes as a sensation of falling, moving, dissolving, overcame him. He would have fallen to his knees, had gravity still had a firm hold of him. As it was, he just felt himself spinning. "Woah woah woah!" Sam held his hands out as if that would calm his brother. "Concentrate on just being here. You're going to tear yourself apart!"

"What the hell, Sammy!" Dean roared in a voice that didn't quite come from his throat as much as it pulsed from somewhere near where his head should be. "You said that I wasn't dead! This feels pretty dead to me!"

"I said you weren't a ghost," his brother replied sheepishly. His sincerity sapped some of the fire from Dean's boiler. Already he felt himself cooling off. The spinning slowed and then stopped. His body took upon a little more weight, the ground pressed up on his feet at last. He gripped his head until the buzzing bees feeling subsided and we was ready to talk again. He very carefully formed words.

"What did you do to me, Sam? Is this some kind of witchcraft? Did you voodoo me back?" He tried to take a step forwards, advancing on his brother. It wasn't that he stumbled, not exactly. He just failed to move forward. All of his limbs seemed to be the wrong size.

"I didn't do anything _to_ you," Sam admitted, his emphasis telling. "You died, Dean. Like, really died. You got shot with the Colt."

"What? What do you mean I got shot with the Colt. Isn't that supposed to, I don't know, kill me dead for real? If I got shot with the Colt, how am I still here right now? Shouldn't I be trucking my way right to Nonexistenceville?" Dean carefully tried to take another step. He desperately needed to pace right now. This was a situation that called for pacing. He managed to gain some traction, but it was like trying to walk on ice. Dean paced regardless, if cautiously. "I mean, if I was shot by the Colt, there would be nothing left of me to bring back. So how the hell am I still here?"

Sam looked studiously at his shoes. He picked a fleck of drying mud from his ruined jeans as the eyes of his lost brother burned into him. "Do you… do you remember that case we worked in Texas. The Hell house those kids had mocked up as a prank?"

Realization slowly came upon Dean as memories slowly floated to the surface like fish in a murky pond. "Yeah, that Mordechai weirdo with the noose. Except he wasn't a guy at all, or even a ghost. He was one of those, what do you call them… a…" He searched for the word. "A tulpa, yeah. Tibetan symbols and everything. Not a ghost at all…" He stopped. The feeling of flying apart threatened to overwhelm him again, but he fought it down. He had to keep it together. "Sam, please tell me I'm not…" Sam looked up at then, then looked past him with pointed eyes. Dean slowly forced himself to turn in place. Behind him stood the silent form of his Baby, his black 1967 Chevrolet Impala. The usually glossy paint was stained in the rain, making it seem dull and matte in the early morning light. Dean's eyes boggled as they fell on the machine's expansive hood. Symbols had been daubed atop the paint that he'd applied himself, in wide sweeping lines of a chalky grey paint or other paste. Dean recognized the curves and whorls. Dean reached out his hand.

"Don't… don't touch it. It's not dry yet. I don't know what disrupting the symbols will do." Sam called. He quickly walked between his brother and the marked up car.

"You didn't…" Dean said in disbelief. "You painted this _on the car?_ "

Sam was taken aback, rendered momentarily speechless. "That's what you're mad about? The car? Nothing else here?"

"Hell no, I'm mad about all the other stuff too, but did you have to paint it on my Baby? What even is this stuff anyway? Doesn't look like auto paint, I can tell you that right now."

"It's kind of… your ashes." Sam admitted.

"My wha… For fu… Sam, do you have any idea what ashes will do to the paintjob? Do you even know?" Dean was beside himself, the anger at his brother's witchcraft momentarily forgotten. "If this starts to peel, I swear I will haunt your ass, Colt or no Colt. I'll find a way, you hear me?" Slowly he calmed down. He looked forlornly at the ash inscribed symbol on the front of his trusty steed. "How in the hell did you get this thing to work, anyway? I thought you needed a whole bunch of people thinking about it all at once to make the tulpa… you know… tulparate."

"Yeah, if you're just harnessing the power of thought alone," Sam answered, dropping almost without pause into the mode of research geek. "I mean, if you don't know what you're doing, or your subjects aren't acting with intent. The tulpa we fought needed a bunch of people on the internet because none of them were actually trying to summon it. The old monks, and the newer magicians, they can could just summon up a tulpa at will. Now I'm not as strong as them, but I… connected the symbol to what I was trying to summon. That's why it had to be the car."

"And why it had to be my ashes, right? I mean, how much closer a connection to me can you get?"

"Exactly!" Sam rejoined, nodding enthusiastically. "After that it was just a matter of getting the meditation techniques down and… Wow, you're totally here. I did it!"

"You know, it's kind of creepy how excited you are about all of this." Dean groused. He stopped trying to get around his brother and kicked at a rock. There was a significant lag between his toe hitting the stone and the stone rocketing off into the yard.

Before Sam could respond, a yell cut across the yard. Both brothers whirled on the noise. Bobby stood in the open doorway to his house, his knitted brow a storm cloud above eyes that flashed like lightening. "Just what in the hell is going on here!?"

* * *

Bobby sat in his favorite chair. It was small comfort given the circumstances, but a petty luxury that the old man desperately needed right now. He glowered across the cramped study at the younger Winchester, who for his part looked appropriately admonished. His lanky hair fell about his downcast head, hiding his face from the stare of his mentor. Between them, the spectral form of Dean stood with arms crossed. Sooner or later, one of them was going to have to talk.

"Well. Looks like you've gone and done it now, boy." It looked like Bobby would break the deadlock. "Just what in the hell were you thinking? And right after I just got done telling you…"

"This is different, Bobby," Sam said through gritted teeth. "There's no dark magic or necromancy going on here. I just needed…"

"You needed what, Sam? You needed Dean back?" Bobby's words cut deep, his tone was acid. "For Christ's sake, boy, you think we all haven't lost someone in this fight? You've been lucky in the past, real lucky to have had both of you last this long, but everyone's luck runs out eventually. That's just the nature of this job. It's the risk everybody takes when they find out that there are things that go bump in the night and decide to start bumping back. The risk that everybody doesn't take is to start fooling around with magic, or demons, or angels. But you can't seem to keep yourself away from that, can you? How can you be so damn selfish!?"

Somewhere mid tirade, Bobby had stood from his chair. He was much shorter than the target of his ire, but with Sam slouched so far into the couch that he nearly disappeared into the stuffing, the older hunter towered over him red faced.

"I told you, it's not dark magic. I made a tulpa." Sam answered. He still hadn't stopped contemplating his shoes. "It's grey at worst. I know what I'm doing."

"A tulpa? Sam, you should know better than summoning a tulpa. After all the trouble that one in Texas gave you? And you go and whip one up in _my_ house? I got enough things around here that want to kill me without adding another, especially one wearing your brother's face." Bobby wiped sweat from his face angrily. "You know the lore; these things always turn on their creators. That's why real sorcerers burn through them so fast. Summon them up, throw 'em away. You do know how to dismiss it, don't you?"

"I'm not going to need to dismiss him. He's Dean!" Sam reacted. He looked up and locked eyes on his mentor. He bolted from his seat, the difference in height between the two immediately becoming apparent. Bobby did not back down, but the outburst seemed to put him on the back foot.

"That thing is not Dean!" Bobby hissed through clenched teeth. "It's some kind of spirit that you've pressed through a Dean shaped mold. It's dangerous and you should get rid of it before it decides to get rid of you."

The door slammed at the front of the house, drawing the attention of both arguing hunters. Sam fixed the older man with a sharp, accusatory look and rushed for the exit. "Dean!" he called after his brother. "Dean, stop!" By the time he reached the front door, Dean was nowhere to be found. He called out again, to no avail. Behind him, Bobby was hurrying to follow. Before the older man could stop him, Sam ripped the door open and stormed out into the yard. The midday sun was obscured by clouds. The day threatened to be another rainy one. Darkness on the horizon gave tell to another burgeoning storm. Already the wind was picking up, whistling through the stacked bodies of broken cars. The rusted metal became a mournful orchestra. Sam scanned the untimely twilight, desperately searching for his brother. Then, he saw him. Dean was emerging from the toolshed, an axe held in his hands and his face set in a scowl of determination. Sam stopped, momentarily confused. Then he saw which direction Dean was moving in. The Impala. Sam took off after him.

Dean looked down on the swirling lines. Painted on the hood of his car in his own ashes. Or in Dean's ashes, he supposed. Dean was dead, he was just an imposter. And a dangerous one. He wasn't going to let that put his brother in danger. Or put Sam in danger. The tulpa shook his head to clear it, but it only made things worse. _God damn it, Sam. Why'd you have to go and make things complicated. Why couldn't you just have let me go._ The axe was heavy in his hands. Everything was more solid now, despite the earth shaking revelations. He could feel the grain of the wooden handle under his thumb, the way the weighty metal head pushed it more into one hand than the other. Solid. He raised the solid axe over his head, his eyes still boring into the Tibetan spirit sigil. All he had to do was punch a hole in it and it would be done. Sam would be safe, he wouldn't have to life this fake half-life, and Bobby wouldn't have to disown his only remaining surrogate son. The tulpa froze up, a lump forming in his throat. The cloud dappled light glinted dully off the black paint of the car. He took a hand off the axe to run it along the cool dark metal. It was smooth beneath rough, callused fingers. The touch sent a chill up his spine. "I hate to do this to you, Baby, but I gotta. I hope you understand. This is the way it's got to be." Still, he found himself unable to begin his downward swing.

"Dean, please. Don't do it!" Sam skated into the small clearing with his hands outstretched. Dean sighed and straightened up, resting the axe on his shoulder.

"I'm not your brother, Sammy. Just some thing you whipped up on your little vision quest there. You heard what Bobby said. I'm going to turn on you. Then we'd both be dead." The wind picked up as he made his pronouncement, kicking litter across the dirt lot.

"It doesn't matter…" Sam began, but he was interrupted.

"Of course it matters." Dean barked. "You think Dean would be happy with me just taking his place if he knew that one day I might just up and try to brain you with this?" He hefted the axe for emphasis. "I don't think so. So I'm going to put this little science experiment back in the box. Don't worry, Sammy. You're going to do just fine without me." He tried to ignore the mournful look on Sam's face, the eyes that begged him silently to put down the axe. He had to turn away. He raised the axe solemnly over his head and prepared to mar the painted symbol and consign himself to oblivion. That was when something hit him from the side.

Dean was bowled over as someone football tackled him to the ground, pinning the axe against his sternum. "Dean!" Sam cried as whatever it was snarled at his brother. It pounded on him, raising its fist again and again to rain blows on the stunned tulpa. Sam loped over to try and push it off of him. The thing looked up with a frenzied look in its eyes. Its pale flesh was scalded red and as Sam watched he could see it peel under the light of the cloud covered sun. As he got closer, it gnashed its teeth, revealing a nest of sharply pointed fangs that jutted from its split lips. A vampire. Sam stopped short. He didn't have a blade on him; he wasn't even carrying a gun. His pause proved ill timed. The vampire lashed out at him with a booted foot, catching him low in the gut and knocking the air from his lungs. Sam was thrown back against a stack of cars by the savagery of the blow. Before he could recover, the vampire drew back and then plunged his fanged maw into Dean's throat. Gore cascaded out through the serrated teeth as the vamp began to saw back and forth across his neck.

Finally, he let the limp form go. The interloping fang gave a broad toothy grin. "Mother Eve will be pleased," he said, licking his lips. "But not as pleased as I. I knew I was destined for great things. Killing a Winchester." The fang raked dirty fingernails through his long unwashed hair, dragging blood into the filthy mat. "Or two Winchesters. Your like has made my kind miserable for years. But not any longer. No." The vamp stalked forwards, ignoring the painful effect of the sun. With a sudden durst of speed, his hand was around Sam's neck. The vamp lifted, dragging his back up against the rusted metal of the car. "I will enjoy this."

"Not as much as I will," a rough voice said from over the vampire's shoulder. Surprise barely had time to make its way across the beast's grimy face before there was a whistling sound terminating in a meaty thud. A shining metal axehead sprouted from the monster's jugular. Sam clamped his mouth shut against the splatter of blood. The grip on his throat lessened and he felt himself collapse against the car as the vampire backed away, slowly crumpling towards the ground. Dean was standing behind him, seemingly unaffected by the livid red bite mark marching across his neck. The axe was in his hands, and he raised it high in the air. Sam flinched, but the blow fell not on him but on the vampire again. Dean struck it again and again, until the head rolled away from a ruined stump of a neck. Dean threw the axe down on its still corpse in disgust and looked up and Sam. Silence hung in the air between the two brothers.

"Must be getting rusty," he grunted. "Never would have let a greasy looking fang like this sneak up on me before."

"Thank you," Sam grated out, clutching his abused throat.

"Yeah well, what else was I going to do?" Dean asked with a noncommittal shrug of the shoulders. He winced as he reached up to touch the ragged hole at his neck. Already the mark was beginning to fade, like ink being rinsed from a page. "Huh, well that's different."

"Tulpas run off of belief," Sam answered. "Guess I never quite believed that a vamp could take you down." He smiled wanly and accepted his brothers hand as he dragged himself back to his feet. "That's why I'm not worried about you turning on me. I believe that's a possibility."

"Now don't get all sappy on me, Sammy," Dean shot back. "Maybe you're right, maybe I can stick around for a while." He looked back at the Impala, then up at the iron gray sky. "Looks like it's about to rain, aren't you worried it'll wash me away?"

"It might. If you're sticking around, maybe we should throw a top coat over that thing. Like a fresh coat of paint or something. I don't think it needs to be visible to work."

"Or," Dean said slowly, turning towards his brother with a familiar smirk across his face. "You could go grab your nail polish. Bitch." He slugged his brother on the arm and jogged off towards the car.

"You jerk." Sam rejoined, slipping easily into the old rituals. A smile creased his face for the first time since Fairview.


End file.
